‘Are the French there, sir?’
Sharpe shrugged. ‘Probably.’
The Sergeant looked round their high, sun-bleached path. ‘I hope they’re not watching for us.’
‘Better than being down with the Partisans.’ But he knew Harper was right. If the French were patrolling the hills, and they must be, then the Company would be visible for miles, Sharpe made his own gold-filled pack more comfortable on his shoulder. ‘We’ll keep going west in the night.’ He looked at his tired men. ‘Just this one effort, Sergeant, just this one.’
It was not to be. At dusk, as the westering sun dazzled them, the ridge dropped away and Sharpe saw they had been cheated. The ridge was like an island, separated from the other hills by a wide, convoluted valley, and in its shadows, far below, he could see the tiny dots that were El Catolico’s men. He stopped the Company, let them rest, and stared down.
‘Damn. Damn. Damn.’ He spoke quietly. The Partisans had ridden an easy path, either side of the ridge, and the Company had slogged its useless toil over the baking rocks, the edged stones, the scorpion-infested ridge. On the far side of the valley the hills rose again and he looked at the bouldered slope they would have to climb, but he knew that before they could go on they must cross the valley. It was a perfect place for an ambush. Like an indented sea-coast the valley had hidden spurs, deep shadows; even, to the north, some scrubby trees. Once they were on the valley’s grassed floor they would be terribly vulnerable, unable to see what ‘ lurked behind the spurs of the hill, in the dead folds of ground. Sharpe stared into the shadowed depth and then at his exhausted Company with their battered weapons and heavy packs.
‘We cross at dawn.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Harper looked down. ‘The Major’s coming, sir.’
Kearsey had abandoned his horse and, his blue uniform melding with the shadows, was climbing the slope towards the Company. Sharpe grunted.
‘He can say a prayer for us.’ He looked at the valley. A prayer, maybe, would not be a bad thing.
CHAPTER 16
The water in the canteens was brackish, the food down to the last mildewed crumbs, and in the hour before dawn the ground was slippery with dew. It was cold. The Company, foul-mouthed and evil-tempered, slithered and fell as they went down the dark hillside to the black valley. Kearsey, his steel scabbard crashing against rocks, tried to keep up with Sharpe.
‘Almeida, Sharpe. It’s the only way!’
Sharpe stopped, towered over the Major. ‘Damn Almeida, sir.’
‘There’s no need for cursing, Sharpe.’ Kearsey sounded peevish. He had arrived, as night fell, and launched himself into a rehearsed condemnation of Sharpe that had petered out when he saw an undamaged Teresa calmly watching him. She had spoken to him in Spanish, driving down his objections, until the Major, confused by the speed of events that he could not control, had fallen into an unhappy silence. Later, when the wind stirred the night grass, and sentries twitched as the black rocks seemed to move, he had tried to persuade Sharpe to turn south. Now, in the creeping dawn, he had returned to the subject.
‘The French, Sharpe. You don’t understand. They’ll be blocking the Coa. You must go south.’
‘And damn the bloody French, sir!’
Sharpe turned away, slipped, and cursed as a boot flew from beneath him and he sat down, painfully, on a stone. He would not go to Almeida. The French were about to start the siege and would be concentrating in force. He would go west, towards the Coa, and take the gold to the General.
The turf on the valley floor was springy, easy to walk, but Sharpe crouched and hissed at his men to be quiet. He could hear nothing, see nothing, and his instinct told him the Partisans had gone. Sergeant Harper crouched beside him.
‘Bastards have gone, sir.’
‘They’re somewhere.’
‘Not here.’
And if not, then why had they gone? El Cat6lico would not give up the gold, nor Moreno the chance to punish the man whom he thought had mutilated his daughter, so why was the valley so empty and quiet? Sharpe led the way over the grass, his rifle cocked, and looked at the hill ahead, littered with rocks, and he imagined the muskets ambushing them as they climbed. The hillside could hide a thousand men.